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The Final Blog

 The ways in which environmental change has impacted and will further impact water in Africa are far too great to be contained within this blog and there are countless other examples I could have included. Environmental change is not going anywhere. The pressure and legislation simply isn’t there to prevent us from exceeding the 1.5oC temperature rise that the Paris agreement sought to keep us under. There will continue to be a global, environmental response to the increasing temperature, but management is key to mitigating its impact on human populations.

The majority of African countries are often quoted as having a high vulnerability and low adaptability to climate change. However, I’d argue that many African people have been successfully adapting to changing environmental conditions for millennia, with incredibly complex agricultural systems, pastoral and hydrological systems driven by the seasonal variability in rainfall. The African Climate Report in 2005 discussed how adaption to existing climate variability would be hugely useful in adapting to climate change and I agree. With the right governmental support, funding and guidance, communities across Africa will be able to build upon their existing adaption capabilities. Hand in hand with efforts to keep global temperatures from rising as much as possible, this possibility seems to create hope in the bleak face of climate change.

That’s not to say it’s all sunshine and rainbows- as evidenced by COP27 governments are often unwilling or unable to fund the effort needed to adapt to climate change. This increases the importance of conversations such as we’ve had on this blog and the vital research done by academics across Africa and further afield. The issue of environmental change in Africa has to keep being refreshed and discussed to increase the pressure needed for truly impactful management to occur.

Thank you so much for reading,

Briony 

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